iPhone 5 For Dummies, 6th Edition -or- A How To Use an iPhone Book that Even Your 60 Year Old Mother Can Understand

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Okay, you convinced your mother to get an iPhone, and now she keeps calling you to ask you how to use it. “If only there was a manual for it that she could understand,” you think to yourself.

Well friends, THERE IS, and we’re going to give you a review of it.

The book is called: iPhone 5 for Dummies (6th Edition, in full color!), and it covers not just the iPhone 5 but also the 4S and 4. This is a winner of a book for anyone who has recently received an iPhone and doesn’t know how to use it to its potential. You can read through the entire book from cover to cover, or just hit any one of the 19 chapters to learn more about your iPhone. Unless you’ve Googled (or maybe I should say “Safaried”) just about anything and everything about an iPhone or are just a technological whiz, I’m pretty sure you’ll learn something that you didn’t know about your iPhone before.

I’m not a stranger to Apple products, I have an iPod Touch and an iPad. But I’m an iPhone owner for the first time just this past month. I purchased a 4S on Thanksgiving weekend and I was itching to go through the book to find out how I can get the most out of this smartphone. At just $14.65 on Amazon.com (also available at other retailers), it is a small investment to maximize that iPhone you just bought either outright with no contract (like me!) or with a pricey contract. That’s not much to spend to get the most out of a couple hundred dollar+ device.

So in the iPhone 5 for Dummies book you will learn to:

• Set up your iPhone, send and receive e-mail, and download apps
• Browse the web, capture and share photos and video, and listen to music
• Video chat with FaceTime, get organized with reminders, and stay connected with Notification Center
• Learn how to sync it with your computer or iCloud to make sure you can restore your info if you need to
• oh yeah, and if it wasn’t obvious…how to use the Phone, texting and iMessaging feature on it

Trust me though, if you know how to do all that, there are still things that you’ll get out of the book, plus, the authors Edward C. Baig and Bob “Dr.Mac” LeVitus have made it fun to read.  Why have a smartphone of this caliber if you aren’t going to use it the way it was intended?

Some of iOS 6 was completely new to me on an iDevice, because when I got my iPad, I turned my iTouch over to my daughter. Take Passbook for instance. I had NO clue how to use it. iPhone 5 for Dummies, explained what it is and how to use it. Hooray! (I was chagrined at first that every time I opened Passbook, it had nothing in it!)

Despite having used the other devices, I learned how to move my icons from one screen to another, which I thought could only be done through connecting the device to my computer and going through iTunes…wrong! Now I can move them around however I want, whenever I want, no tethering myself with a cable anymore.

I learned how to use the camera to its fullest potential. I learned how to use the camera to take a panormaic shot.  I did pretty good on my first attempt on the shot I took of my kitchen (excuse the messy countertops okay?!).

Siri is now one of my BFFs. She can tell me the latest football scores, what the weather is like, how many calories is in that piece of cheesecake I know I shouldn’t eat anyway….  She helps me update my Facebook status when I don’t feel like typing, and I learned how to use her from this book!

iPhone 5 for Dummies while beneficial to even those of us that can learn our away around a smartphone without too much trouble, is SUPER for someone who has never used an Apple product, ever.

Written not in code, but in everyday language, even my 63 year old mother would be confident in using an iPhone after going through this book. Get it for the older generation early, really it will save you from many an explanation later!

One perk I really found to iPhone 5 for Dummies was the full color design of it, and the many screenshots they include in their explanations. Not only did it make it more visually appealing and easier to follow…I found some great apps to download on the side!

The downside to this book (as is ANY book that is about technology and gadgets), is that if you wait too long to get it, parts of it will be ‘old’ and their descriptions and illustrations may be out of date. That’s just the nature of the industry, which is obvious by the ‘6th Edition’ of the book. Things change, updates are made, and the iOS is improved upon (hopefully) – meaning that what you read and want to attempt may be a little different than the explanation offered, or something might not be there that was at one time, likewise you may have something new on your device that wasn’t covered in the book.

Truth be told you probably could find a lot of the information in this book online or through other sources, but I myself like things consolidated in one place. If I need to remember how to set up a conference call or use FaceTime, I think it’s much simpler to just grab this book off the shelf and turn to the page where it’s explained, than try to find a tutorial that’s understandable on the interwebs.  I’ve Post-it marked a bunch of pages that I know I’ll use at a future date when the occasion arises.

If you want to learn more about iPhone 5 for Dummies (remember it also covers the iPhone 4 and 4S) visit the Dummies website. Read a Sample Chapter here.

I received a copy of iPhone 5 For Dummies from John Wiley & Sons, Inc. for review. All opinions are my own. Published by Tammy Litke.